Wednesday, March 4, 2009

What Newbery Winners Have You Given Up On?

Or which ones have you had to force yourself to finish (because it was assigned, or you were doing it for something like this project, or because you can't stand not finishing books)?

This post inspired by Roger Sutton's post on Giving Up, which also asks:

Fessing Up: how much of a book do you have to have read in order to say that you read it?

Which I would guess is something that many of us could answer when it comes to The Story of Mankind (for me, maybe about two thirds, but it's hard to say because I jumped around so much).

I haven't read all the Newbery winners yet - and some of the ones that seem the least interesting to me are in my unread pile. But out of the fifty-some that I've read, Shadow of a Bull, ....And Now Miguel, and Up a Road Slowly were a few that I would have bailed on if I weren't on a mission to read all of the winners.

I was glad that I'd persevered with all of these, at least, which isn't always the case with some books. With unredeemingly bad books, you resent the author and blame them for the time you wasted and the money you spent. Or you're sorry that the library is counting the fact that you checked that book out as a positive in circulation records for a particular title (I think Daniel Boone is the only Newbery book in that category for me).

I'm curious about which winners the rest of you have tried repeatedly to read, or which of the ones you've read that you really wanted to give up on?

3 comments:

Amanda said...

I haven't read too many of the early winners yet. It was a bit of a struggle to get through Smoky, the Cowhorse and Waterless Mountain, I must admit. The only one I haven't read completely through so far, I admit, is The Voyages of Dr. Dolittle, but I read parts of four different versions of it that it feels like I read it all!

Kristen said...

Smoky was hard for me to wade through too. Along with M.C. Higgins the Great, and Missing May. I know some people really like those books so I'm sorry. Slave Dancer wasn't hard to read but difficult and a painful subject. I also feel obligated to say that Dr. Dolittle is not (to me) a great book, in fact it is proof that childrens lit has improved.

Sandy D. said...

Add "Smoky" to my list of difficult to finish winners. It seemed endless.